Nocturne Halifax 2015: Friend to be Found

Last week, TPH had the opportunity to participate in Nocturne: Art at Night, an annual event celebrating the arts community in downtown Halifax with over 80 unique exhibitions available to the general public, free of charge.

This year, TPH got involved with the event by creating a project with TPH Halifax employee and local artist, Jason Skinner, on the “Friend To Be Found” project. This installation served as an interactive Nocturne-wide manhunt made possible by instant photo printing and social media.

How did it work?

Our TPH location at 1809 Barrington Street served as the hub for this project – all its windows were blacked out except for a single opening which held a camera lens, providing a live feed of the street. Participants were photographed, and a 3” x 6” printout was created by TPH and distributed to another person at a later time throughout the night. The goal of the exhibition was to have people find the assigned “friend” featured in their printout, by means of social media and the hashtag “#friendfoundnocturne”.

In total, a more than 400 photos were taken and distributed: five connections were made instantly, where the person in the photo was identified as a friend, neighbour or classmate, and three connections were made over social-media.

This installation was a unique and engaging combination of print and digital technology which encouraged participants to reach outside their comfort zone and meet new people. “Friend To Be Found” was cited as a crowd favourite by the Chronicle Herald out of the 80 attractions offered, and was also listed in two “Top 5” lists in the Nocturne Event Guide: the “Nocturne Guide to Breaking Up” and the “Top 3 Projects For Your Smartphone”.

Check out the video below to see a time lapse of the live feed captured by TPH: